Luba Shapiro Grenader conveys profound insight into human psychology through her visceral, thought-provoking 3-d series titled “Soul Weavings: Transcending Through Deconstruction and Renewal.” She communicates a myriad of complex truths about human existence.
Mixed media wall sculptures, partially free-standing pieces, and “sculptures in the round” comprise her compelling portfolio. They provide an immersive and transformative experience that enlightens and empowers viewers. They provide an immersive and transformative exploration of disparity and correlation.
In Luba’s narrative art we view an expansive range of personal, spiritual and universal concerns that encompass relationships with our bodies and minds to interactions with the natural world and more. It stimulates inner analysis, self-discovery, and guides us on an in-depth journey toward self-healing, recovery and renewal.
Luba integrates original drawings and paintings with “found” materials to produce her poignant 3-d works of art. With skillful innovation and poetic sensibility Luba conjoins traditional and unconventional materials culled from diverse sources. Her masterful, expressive drawings of faces in conté and charcoal and her paintings in watercolor are juxtaposed with organic and utilitarian items such as handmade paper, wood, fabric, eggshells, wire and staples.
Luba’s inimitable and intricate methods include twisting wire and yarn, dyeing fabric with natural dyes, and other experimental processes to sculpt fibers and fabrics into branching forms. These flowing elements emanate a lyrical and rhythmic panoply of visual effects and evoke a plethora of provocative symbolic references. Their highly charged energy remains long after viewing her art.
Luba articulates many forces within humans and nature that include courage and resilience, vulnerability and fragility in addition to pain and angst. She reflects our intrinsic responses and coping mechanisms as we endure, overcome, persevere, and triumph in the face of physical, material, and subconscious challenges.
Luba is an important contemporary artist who possesses an authentic artistic vocabulary and unique vision. As a Russian immigrant who fled Soviet Russia with her dissident family and settled north of Boston where she has resided since the early 1990s. She brings her personal life experiences, heritage, acute sensitivity, and empathy to her art.
Luba summons much needed introspection and challenges us to confront important issues about the human condition, the environment, our beliefs about our place in the world, and more. She compels us to draw our own interpretations from her healing creations so we may evolve and achieve our fullest potential.
Visit Luba Shapiro Grenader’s website lubagrenader.com
This Art Review was written by Renee Phillips, Director and Curator, Manhattan Arts International and The Healing Power of ART & ARTISTS, New York, NY.
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This is wonderful, I find the work very powerful and this review gives it justice. I think it is important for artists to make genuine artwork which confronts personal challenges. These personal traumas and healing connects us globally.
Thank you Isaac for your comment. I totally agree with you. Luba is an important artist of our time. I’m sure she has and will continue to inspire more artists to follow her lead.